Jul. 16, 2013

Written by

Detroit Free Press Staff Writer

The National Press Photographers Association says it appears police violated the First Amendment rights of a Detroit Free Press photographer when she was arrested after trying to get her iPhone back from a police officer who told her to stop filming on a public street and took her phone.

Mickey Osterreicher, general counsel for the NPPA, wrote a letter today to new Detroit Police Chief James Craig, expressing concerns over photographer Mandi Wright’s arrest and the fact that the SIM card went missing from her phone after police confiscated it.

Wright was arrested Thursday after briefly filming the arrest of a suspect on a public street. Wright said she didn’t know the man approaching her at the scene was a police officer because he wasn’t in uniform and didn’t identify himself.

“In any free country the balance between actual vigilance and over-zealous enforcement is delicate,” Osterreicher wrote. “It may be understandable that law enforcement officers have a heightened sense of awareness after pursuing an armed suspect — but that is no excuse for blatantly violating a person’s First Amendment rights — as appears to be the case here.”

He told Craig that the organization, which has nearly 7,000 members, “has pointed out to numerous groups and law enforcement agencies; photography by itself is not a suspicious activity and is protected by the First Amendment. Unfortunately the reliance by law enforcement officers to question, detain and interfere with lawful activities by photographers has become a daily occurrence.”

Detroit Police spokeswoman Sgt. Eren Stephens today said that an internal affairs investigation and an investigation into Wright’s conduct are ongoing.

Officials also are looking into the missing SIM card from her phone, as well as whether Wright was left alone in an interrogation room with the suspect she had been filming.